Silence as good medicine, just like beauty sleep!

Kalani Wedding Flowers ©LE Fine Art (photo)

“If there were a little more silence, if we all kept quiet…maybe we could understand something.”

  ~Federico Fellini

The month of October was a very special month for me.  After a solid commitment and about 4 months of careful preparation, that included a renewed daily yoga practice, more silence and lots of focused inner work, I felt ready for my retreat at Kalani with one of my teachers’ Cass.  The title of our retreat was Path of Love and its focus was LOVE.  Love as a practice, love for the journey itself, love through all of the spirals, curves, twists, turns and for the SELF.  The retreat center itself was on the Big Island of Hawaii, where Pele the goddess of fire and passion resides.  Kalani retreat center is a beautiful backdrop and sacred container for any retreat, gorgeous jungle, clean air and away from civilization.  Truly a ‘bubble’ enclosing a tropical paradise serving as a crucible for many a phoenix rising.

Our retreat encompassed diving into breath work, movement, art-making, dancing, bio aquatic time in the Watsu pool, silence, sharing and  lots and lots of PLAY in the quantum field of LOVE.  During our 5-day “intensive” together, we honored a day of silence.  This intentional silence time/space truly provided me with my nourishment and the integration that is essential after so much deep unwinding and unraveling…. Yum!  I enjoyed that silence time so much that after retreat concluded, I spent more time in silence during my extended stay at Kalani.  I experienced pure pleasure as I steeped in my own medicinal brew of heightened  SELF awareness, synchronicities and surprises.

Silence has also been a core theme of my long time Raja yoga meditation practice started up in 2001.  So, this was nothing “new” to me, but is so so so integral to propelling my creative evolution forward at this juncture.  What this silence provides for me now is the critical “stitching up” and full embodiment of what emerges and is dis-cover-ed through such a retreat, or any created space for personal growth.  So, as each day rolls out, my beat goes on of weaving the tapestry of my gifts to offer up to our world in a form that is visible, vibrant and juicy…

Thank you for reading and I invite you to write your contributions via comments and connections and would love to hear from you via this blog, my face book page, or email lorien@lorieneck.com.

In love, gratitude and beauty…

Personally Experienced and Recommended Resources

Awake-One

Cass Phelps is an amazing individual and his inspired body of work and offerings have been a phenomenal resource for me! His work is comprehensive, relevant and rich…I am eternally grateful to one of my lifetime teachers, Cass.

Kalani Retreat Center

         Kalani is Hawaii’s largest retreat center, one of the best-loved centers  in the world for more than 35 years.

The Torus

The involuting of the Self into itSelf.

www.lorieneck.com

“When you become aware of silence, immediately there is that state of inner still alertness. You are present. You have stepped out of thousands of years of collective human conditioning.”

-Eckhart Tolle

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The Galactic Tide of Change

Greetings!

©LE Art & Design

My topic for this blog is taking risks, leaps of faith and the concept of attachments.  That’s a lot, right?  Well, I am simply going to touch on these rich focus areas.  I have been ruminating, meditating upon, and moving towards some big changes in my life as of late.  It’s an exciting time to be alive and although I am eternally grateful for the life that I am living now, I see paths ahead that require that I take some key risks and and require that I take a leap!

My daily aim and objective is to achieve not only a degree of clarity about these decisions, changes, and “power moves”, but to also feel a deeper sense of peace and acceptance as I move forward in a specific direction.  This has not been so easy, but I have been getting lots of support and help along the way.  For instance, just today, a friend sent me a little I-ching or sound bite today that said, “Go out on a limb, that’s where the fruit is” and well quite frankly, I feel that this is probably true.  If one truly wants to experience the satisfaction that comes from fulfillment, then, some sort of risk must be taken “out of the comfort zone”.

What also is coming up during this shift for me, is a re-e-valu-ation of my personal attachments.  It is so interesting to me how much actual stuff accumulates, the amount of “things” that form around a person, and how the subtle strings of attachment bind us to get stuck in it all.  Attachments to people, well that is a whole other story!  That is in process too….I am finding my attachments are one of the toughest terrains to navigate at the moment, but will stay determined so that I can reach my goals, stay true, and follow the guidance of my higher self.

So, as I venture ahead, I leave you with these words from Anthony De Mello:

“The moment you pick u pan attachment, the functioning of this lovely apparatus called the human heart is destroyed.”  He says, “You must choose between your attachment and happiness.  You cannot have both.  The moment you pick up an attachment, your heart is thrown off kilter and your ability to lead a joyful carefree life is destroyed.”

Some suggested resources for your journey:

The Way to Love Anthony De Mello

Any book by Anthony De Mello

DNA Evolution

Thank you for reading and I invite you to share your contributions via comments and connections and would love to hear from you via this blog, my face book page, or email lorien@lorieneck.com.

In love and light,

Lórien

www.lorieneck.com

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